Apple's smart home products lineup has encountered yet another setback amid repeated delays. According to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman, Brian Lynch, who served as Apple's chief of home devices since 2022, is leaving the company to join a smart ring maker.
Oura CEO Tom Hale confirmed the move to Bloomberg News, stating: “Brian Lynch, who has been Apple's senior director in charge of home devices since 2022, has joined the ring company as senior vice president of hardware engineering.”
Lynch had been overseeing the hardware development for Apple's upcoming home devices. The company originally planned to release its long-awaited smart display last year, but the product has faced multiple delays, with the latest reports indicating a possible launch as early as September. These delays stem largely from an ongoing, challenging overhaul of Siri. “An update to the voice assistant is crucial to delivering personalised data to the device,” Gurman noted.
Lynch was also associated with Apple's self-driving car project and assisted in developing many iterations of iPods. His departure indicates fresh disruption for Apple's home devices hardware team, which is already struggling with timeline issues, and marks at least the second notable exit from the group in recent years. In 2024, DJ Novotney — a vice president for the home hardware group — had quit Apple as well.
Apple's smart home devices are “central to the company's future growth,” Gurman noted. Among the rumoured devices lined up as part of the Apple Home branding are a smart video doorbell with a Face ID-like capability, a tabletop robot with home security and automation sensor (among other capabilities), a third-generation HomePod speaker, and indoor security cameras.
Gurman wrote that Lynch's exit marks a “fresh upheaval to a division struggling to make headway in the smart home market,” which is dominated by the likes of Google and Amazon.
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